Eleven movies, one TV series

[One to four stars. Four sentences each. No spoilers. Sources: Criterion Channel, HBO Max, Hulu, TCM, YouTube.]

Try and Get Me, aka The Sound of Fury (dir. Cy Endfield, 1950). It’s really two movies: one, a depiction of the twisted relationship between a psychopathic criminal (Lloyd Bridges) and the desperate jobless man (Frank Lovejoy) who becomes his flunky (not partner) in crime; the other, a depiction of a newspaper’s ability to incite a citizenry to mob violence. I first watched this movie in 2020, when the country was already long burning with rage. In the aftermath of January 6, 2021 this story looks even more disturbing. The best scenes: the sad night out and the final minutes at the courthouse. ★★★★ (CC)

*

The Limping Man (dir. Cy Endfield as Charles Lautour, 1953). WWII vet Frank Prior (a markedly different Lloyd Bridges) arrives in London to reconnect with old flame Pauline French (Moira Lister). A murder at the airport and some unsavory recent history complicate the reunion. Lots of good atmosphere in a pub and a theater. But a cheap trick badly compromises the movie’s integrity. ★★ (YT)

*

Roadblock (dir. Harold Daniels, 1951). Charles McGraw is Joe Peters, a straight-arrow insurance detective. Joan Dixon is Diane Morley, an ethically challenged beauty and a stranger to Joe, finagling her way onto a plane by posing, unbeknownst to Joe, as his wife (half-fare). “Honest Joe,” she mockingly calls him, but he falls for her in as big way, and she for him, and as she begins to appreciate the rewards of the good life (morally good, that is), he falls in with a scheme to get her the wealth she no longer wants. With an irrelevant but atmospheric car chase along the Los Angeles River. ★★ (TCM)

*

Strange Bargain (dir. Will Price, 1949). Strange Bargain is a decent B-movie mystery that looks like a blueprint for any Murder, She Wrote episode, with an array of likely suspects, incriminating circumstances and bits of conversation, a quirky police chief (Harry Morgan), everything but a crime-solving novelist. I especially liked the contrast between the concerns of a struggling suburban family (PTA meetings, the price of bicycles) and the dark secret its paterfamilias carries within him. So weird: in 1987, Murder, She Wrote devoted an episode to a sequel to the film, “The Days Dwindle Down,” with Morgan, Jeffry Lynn, and Martha Scott reprising their roles. Did a writer for the show happen across this movie and think that it was déjà vu all over again? ★★★★ (TCM)

*

Dial 1119 (dir. Gerald Mayer, 1950). As the movie begins, we’re in Terminal City, listening to radio station WKYL, which sets the grim tone for what will follow, as Gunther Wyckoff (Marshall Thompson), an escapee from an institution for the criminally insane, holds six people — a barfly, a bartender, a father-to-be, a saggy newspaper man, a couple embarking on an affair — hostage in a bar. William Conrad shines as Chuckles the bartender, on the other side of the counter from his role four years earlier in The Killers. A superior B-picture, but marred by staginess and overacting. A novel element: television, with live coverage from a newscaster in the street playing on a big-screen TV in the bar. ★★★ (TCM)

*

Step by Step (dir. Phil Rosen, 1946). Another superior B-picture, with strong overtones of The 39 Steps. We have an attractive couple thrown together by chance (Lawrence Tierney and Anne Jeffreys), Nazi spies in California, a fake senator, secret intelligence hidden in a jacket, a cute little dog, a fair amount of suspenseful action, and considerable comedy by way of George Cleveland as the proprietor of the Fisherman’s Rest Hotel (cabins by the day or the week). It’s fun to see Tierney begin the movie as something of a dork, locked out of his car and going about in his swimtrunks. But fear not: he will soon become a recognizable Lawrence Tierney, stealing radio tubes and engaging in fisticuffs. ★★★★ (YT)

*

Over-Exposed (dir. Lewis Seiler, 1956). The title and the opening credits promise lurid scandal, but the story is that of a hardworking photographer, Lila Crane (Cleo Moore), who gets close to all the wrong people as she seeks big bucks. “Where there’s money, there’s Lila,” she says. With Richard Crenna as a goody-goody reporter and Raymond Greenleaf as a fading heart-of-gold photographer who shows Lila how to take a picture. My favorite scene: the death mambo. ★★★ (YT)

*

Only Murders in the Building (created by John Hoffman and Steve Martin, 2021). A delightful season of mystery and comedy, with Steve Martin, Martin Short, and Selena Gomez as three podcast-loving residents of a Dakota-like Manhattan condo building who join forces to solve another tenant’s murder. Many quirky moments, many guest stars. Considerable surprising backstory and some witty commentary on phones and texting. My favorite moment: when Steve Martin leaves his apartment in the final episode, he’s wearing his hat. ★★★★ (H)

*

The Thief (dir. Russell Rouse, 1952), The title makes the point: not The Nuclear Physicist, not The Spy. Allan Fields (Ray Milland) is a thief, photographing pages of secret information to be passed from courier to courier before leaving the country. The gimmick here: it’s a silent movie, in which expressive faces, an incessantly ringing telephone, and the musical score (Herschel Burke Gilbert) tell the story. With great scenes of the Library of Congress, midtown Manhattan, and the Empire State Building. ★★★★ (YT)

*

Decoy (dir. Jack Bernhard, 1946). Yet another superior B-movie, combining economy of means and extravagance of imagination. The premise: revive a convict after his execution with the help of a willing doctor and the seemingly fictitious (but real) chemical Methylene Blue. Herbert Rudley is the increasingly desperate doctor; Jean Gillie, the vicious siren; Robert Armstrong and Edward Norris, the hoodlums. Watching Armstrong here, I can almost believe he was a real-life hood. ★★★★ (YT)

*

The Raven (dir. Lew Landers, 1935). Boris Karloff gets top billing, but it’s Bela Lugosi’s movie. He plays Dr. Richard Vollin, a retired Poe-obsessed doctor/madman who’s devised a gruesome triple-play to kill the woman he sees as his Lenore, her fiancé, and her father. Karloff, as an escaped convict in need of plastic surgery, is to assist. My favorite moment: the elevator, a fairly spectacular special effect. ★★★★ (CC)

*

Hollywood Story (dir. William Castle, 1951). Inspired by the murder of movie director William Desmond Taylor. A producer (Richard Conte) decides to make a movie about the unsolved murder of a silent-film director and soon finds his own life in danger, with all sorts of possibilities as to whodunit and who’s doing it now. The plot isn’t much, but there’s plenty of meta and atmosphere (think Sunset Boulevard), with cameos by movie stars, and fine performances from Fred Clark, Henry Hull, and Houseley Stevenson. The final scene on a movie set is quite socko. ★★★★ (YT)

Related reading
All OCA movie posts (Pinboard)